Chapter 8 - THE SCARLET RECKONING
The oak doors did not give way under the battering ram.
Because Beckett Voss opened them from the inside.
The two mercenaries holding the hydraulic ram stumbled forward into the sudden vacuum.
Before their boots touched the threshold, Beckett fired two controlled bursts from his customized shotgun.
Both men flew backward onto the stone portico.
Behind them, Dante Sterling’s strike force poured across the gravel drive.
Muzzle flashes lit up the pouring rain in blinding strobes.
From the second-floor stone balcony, Gideon and Callum stood shoulder to shoulder.
Father and son.
Firing down into the courtyard with ruthless, coordinated rhythm.
Callum fired three rounds, dropped the empty magazine, and slammed a fresh one home in under two seconds.
Muscle memory from thirty years of survival.
"Watch the right flank!" Callum shouted over the gunfire.
"Three men moving toward the greenhouse!"
Gideon pivoted smoothly, putting four rounds into the lead mercenary through the rain.
"I see them," Gideon replied, his voice chillingly steady.
"Keep your head down, Father."
"You're not bulletproof anymore."
Down in the great hall, the battle took a savage turn.
A tear-gas canister crashed through the upper transom window, hissing thick white chemical smoke across the flagstones.
Piers pulled two gas masks from a cabinet, tossing one to his mother.
Rosalind took the mask, but she did not put it on.
She stepped into the adjoining dining room, where the air was still clear.
Suddenly, a shadow lunged through the smoke.
Dante Sterling himself.
He wore a rain-soaked Kevlar vest over an expensive black turtleneck.
His face was scarred from a Chicago gang war ten years prior.
In his hands, he held a shortened submachine gun.
He saw Sloane Mercer tied to the wooden chair, the black tape across her mouth.
"Stupid girl," Sterling spat.
He didn't move to cut her loose.
He reached into his tactical pouch and pulled out a remote detonator.
"She doesn't matter," Sterling muttered.
"The thermite charges on your foundation do."
Sloane’s eyes widened in sheer, paralyzing horror.
She realized what Sterling had done.
He hadn't come to rescue her.
He had planted charges around the entire exterior of Blackwood Manor while his men distracted the guards.
He was going to bury everyone—including her—beneath fifty tons of collapsed granite.
Muffled screams tore against the black tape on Sloane's lips.
She threw herself sideways, overturning the chair, frantically trying to crawl toward Rosalind.
The woman she had slapped two hours ago was now the only human being in the room who might let her live.
"Step away from the table, Rosalind," Sterling snarled, leveling his weapon at her chest.
"Call your dogs off."
"Tell Gideon to sign the port rights over to Detroit."
Rosalind did not move.
She stood beneath the portrait of her grandfather, her hands folded gracefully in front of her.
"You always were an amateur, Dante," Rosalind said.
Her voice cut through the gunfire outside like a crystal bell.
"You think power is about who holds the biggest gun."
"It isn't."
"Power is about who controls the switch."
Sterling smirked, raising his thumb over the red detonator button.
"Goodbye, Mrs. Voss."
He pressed the button.
Nothing happened.
A soft, electronic chirp sounded from the corner behind the dining room curtains.
Piers stepped out from the shadows.
He was holding a portable signal scrambler the size of a cigarette pack.
The little green light on its face blinked peacefully.
"Frequency blocked, moron," Piers said.
"I hijacked your radio receiver forty seconds after your truck hit the front lawn."
"Your charges are disarmed."
Sterling’s eyes flashed with animal panic.
He raised his submachine gun to tear Piers apart.
He never got the chance.
A gunshot cracked from the grand staircase.
A single 9mm bullet tore through Sterling’s right shoulder, spinning him around.
Callum stood on the third step, his weapon smoking, his arm extended with iron stability.
"Nobody touches my son," Callum whispered through bloody teeth.
Sterling dropped his weapon, screaming in pain, clutching his shattered shoulder.
Beckett stepped through the smoke behind Sterling.
Like a shadow rising from the grave.
Beckett grabbed Sterling by the back of his tactical vest with one hand.
He lifted the two-hundred-pound mobster clean off his feet and slammed him face-down onto the glass-covered floor.
Beckett planted his heavy combat boot squarely on the back of Sterling's neck.
The gunshots outside began to fade.
One by one, the engines went silent.
The sirens died.
Through the broken doors, thirty Blackwood guards entered the hall, dragging five wounded mercenaries in zip-ties.
The siege of Blackwood was over.
It had taken twenty-two minutes.
Rosalind walked over to where Sterling lay pinned beneath Beckett's boot.
She looked down at the man who had tried to wipe out her bloodline.
Then she looked at Sloane Mercer, who was weeping uncontrollably on the floor, her cheek pressed against broken glass.
"Gideon," Rosalind said softly.
"Yes, Mother?"
"Call the Commission."
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"Tell them the Voss family has two prisoners."
"And tell them the tribunal will convene at dawn."
